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William Ewart Gye

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William Ewart Gye FRS (born William Ewart Bullock; 11 August 1889, Breaston – 14 October 1952) was a British pathologist and cancer researcher.[1][2][3]

Career

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After a difficult financial struggle, Bullock matriculated at University College, Nottingham and, after studying chemistry under Kipping, graduated there with a BSc in 1906.

In 1911, Bullock married his first wife, Elsa Gye, who was a dedicated suffragette.[4] Bullock studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh and in 1912 graduated there MBChB. In 1913 he received his Doctor of Medicine qualification from the university, and won a gold medal for his medical thesis.[5] He also won the Ellis Prize in Physiology for his essay, “The chemistry of nerve degeneration.”[6]

In 1913, he joined the staff of the Imperial Cancer Research Fund,[2] which at that time was under the direction of Ernest Francis Bashford.[7] When World War I started, Bullock joined the Royal Army Medical Corps and served in France and then Italy in charge of a field ambulance unit.[8] He was reassigned to London as a hospital pathologist and worked with William Cramer on gas gangrene.[9]

After demobilization with the rank of captain, he joined the National Institute for Medical Research at Hampstead, where he worked with Edgar Hartley Kettle on silicosis.[10] In June 1919,[11] William Bullock's wife retook her maiden name, and William Ewart Bullock changed his surname to "Gye",[4] perhaps because he wanted to please his wife[4] and perhaps because he was irritated by having to often explain that he was not the bacteriologist William Bulloch — there is a theory that the name change was in gratitude to a benefactor (not Bullock's wife or father-in-law).[12]

With W. J. Purdy, Gye conducted experiments confirming Peyton Rous's claims concerning the Rous sarcoma virus.[13] Gye was the director of the Imperial Cancer Research Fund's laboratories at Mill Hill from 1934 to 1949, when he resigned due to ill health. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1938 and a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians in 1940.[citation needed]

Gye's and his first wife, Elsa, had three sons together. She died of cancer in 1943. On 30 December 1944,[14] Gye married ophthalmologist Ida Mann (later Dame Ida Mann) and, in 1949, they moved to Perth, Western Australia.[8]

References

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  1. ^ "Inspiring Physicians | RCP Museum – William Ewart Gye, Munks Roll Details, Lives of the fellows, Royal College of Physicians". munksroll.rcplondon.ac.uk. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  2. ^ a b Andrewes CH (1953). "William Ewart Gye. 1884-1952". Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society. 8 (22): 418–430. doi:10.1098/rsbm.1953.0008. S2CID 162165139.
  3. ^ Craigie, J. (1952). "Dr. W. E. Gye". Nature. 170 (4333): 825. Bibcode:1952Natur.170..825C. doi:10.1038/170825a0. PMID 13013220.
  4. ^ a b c Crawford, Elizabeth (2003). "Gye, Elsa (1881–1943)". The Women's Suffrage Movement: A Reference Guide, 1866–1928. Routledge. p. 254. ISBN 9780415239264.
  5. ^ Bullock, W. E. (1913). "A contribution to the chemical pathology of the lipoids". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  6. ^ Bullock, W. E. (1913). "The chemistry of nerve degeneration". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  7. ^ Hayward, J. A. (8 September 1923). "Obituary. Ernest Francis Bashford, O.B.E., M.D." British Medical Journal. 2 (3271): 440–441. doi:10.1136/bmj.2.3271.440-a. PMC 2316986.
  8. ^ a b "W. E. Gye. M.D., F.R.C.P., F.R.S". British Medical Journal. 2 (4790): 945–946. 25 October 1952. PMC 2021835. PMID 12978397.
  9. ^ Bullock WE; Cramer W (1919). "On a new factor in the mechanism of bacterial infection". Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Containing Papers of a Biological Character. 90 (633): 513–529. Bibcode:1919RSPSB..90..513B. doi:10.1098/rspb.1919.0009. JSTOR 80697.
  10. ^ Gye WE; Kettle EH (1922). "Silicosis and miners' phthisis". British Journal of Experimental Pathology. 3 (5): 241–251. PMC 2047740.
  11. ^ "William Ewart Gye" (PDF). The London Gazette. 15 July 1919. p. 9054.
  12. ^ Vischer, Peter (October 1925). "A Romance of the Microscope". Popular Science: 13–14. This story by Peter Vischer alleges that Bullock changed his surname to "Gye" before 1919, but this allegation is false.
  13. ^ Gye WE.; Purdy WJ (1930). "Rous Sarcoma No. 1: Influence of Mode of Extraction on the Potency of Filtrates". British Journal of Experimental Pathology. 11 (3): 211–216. PMC 2048160.
  14. ^ "Biography - Dame Ida Caroline Mann – Australian Dictionary of Biography". adb.anu.edu.au. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
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